WAEC Glitch, Gen Z Students, and the Padded Results -By Abdulkadir Salaudeen

The West African Examination Council used to be an examination body that made students wake up from their slumber in those age that could be called the golden age of Nigerian education. In that age, students were generally dedicated to their studies.  Students that were hitherto not very serious with their studies—as they progressed from junior to senior classes in secondary schools—suddenly became serious when they approached the terminal class (SSS 3). That was because WAEC, in those days, had magical effect on students. It changed students’ attitudes to reading.  Lazy readers among students suddenly became avid readers. WAEC humbled students and students were awed by the mere thought or mention of WAEC.

Parents were, then, very responsible and supportive. Children that were preparing for WAEC were conventionally exempted from house chores. They would not run errands for their parents except when there were compellingly overriding needs to do so. Female children who were preparing for WAEC would be banned from the kitchen and from everything that has to do with the kitchen. Those big boys would not go to the field for evening football matches. Everyone knew the right thing to do. They knew it was time to study; not the time to play.

“O my God! Tolu, why do you look emaciated like this?” said Mama Joy.  In response, “Ma, I am preparing for WAEC,” said Tolu.”

“No wonder, my daughter. Please study hard o. Don’t disappoint your parents o. May God grant you success. Don’t worry my daughter, you will regain your weight after you are done with WAEC”, assured Mama Joy.

“Thank you ma, Mama Joy. I will read harder and I promise not to disappoint you,” said Tolu.

That was a time in Nigerian history of schooling when extramural classes were organized by teachers who were born to teach and were respected by students, even more than their parents. It was also a time that students attended extramural classes without anyone encouraging them to do so because they knew they must study hard to pass and the only way to pass WAEC was through the hard way. The fear of WAEC failure was really the beginning of wisdom. If I should say students studied hard for WAEC as if WAEC result was then a requirement for admission into Paradise, I would be pardoned for that exaggeration. Yes, that will be a commendable exaggeration.

Those who lived in those age can recall. Students who were about to write WAEC spent 5-8 hours a day studying. Some spent even more than that. It was like a reading competition. Then, your worst enemy was he or she that refused to wake you up for night reading. Then, students devised different means to outsmart sleep in order to keep vigil. Some would chew gum (I mean chewing gum), some would have their feet deeped inside bucket filled with water, some would continue to sip hot Lipton, all in attempt to kill sleep. Some would sleep well during the day in order to read extensively at night. 

One can only be nostalgic about those days. We have lost that golden age when WAEC was WAEC and JAMB was JAMB. We are now in the age that Gen Z students, and maybe Gen Z parents, consider studying for these exams as a waste of time. And isn’t it a waste of time? It takes a great courage, a strong desire to acquire knowledge, and a great determination, for any student to study for WAEC or JAMB in this age. In fact, reading for these exams, in this age, is like swimming against the tide. 

It all started with the emergence of miracle centers in about 2-3 decades ago. Once you registered in these centers, be confident that you will pass. It doesn’t matter whether you read or not. I doubt if these miracle centers existed anymore. What we have now are miracle schools that perform miracles than the now moribund miracle centers. In our miracle-working-schools, parents can confront school management if their wards fail. Why? Because they have the “moral” right to do so. After all, they knew how much they paid for “assistance” after paying for WAEC. 

There was a mass failure in the recently released WAEC results. The initial results showed that only 38.32 per cent of the 1,969,313 candidates who sat the examination passed—with credits and above—in five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics. It was adjudged to be the worst results in the past decade. Since students are supposed to pass even without studying in a dysfunctional educational system, WAEC immediately spotted a “technical glitch” in the released results and announced closure of its result portal.

Though few months ago, JAMB also had a glitch and many believed it because its exams are computer based. JAMB addressed the glitch by re-engaging the affected candidates in a rescheduled examination. How did WAEC address its own glitch? Was there a glitch in the first place being a paper based examination? This is the examination body that promises to launch its own CBT by next year. How prepared is WAEC? 

Anyway, after some hours, we were told that the glitch had been resolved. A new version of WAEC results was released. This time around, many would say after the results were padded, 62.96 per cent of the  candidates obtained five credits, including English and Mathematics. This is a great improvement upon the initial version which was 38.32 per cent. But teachers in the higher institutions would suffer a lot to teach some of these students. In fact, and I am speaking from experience, many of them are not teachable. 

I once asked a class of about 60 students in 100 level if there is anyone who wrote WAEC or NECO by themselves, (I pleaded to them to be very honest), only one of them claimed to have written the exams by himself. They all agreed they were all “assisted.” When one observes the pattern of students’ responses to WAEC questions, it is easy to conclude that those answers were either written on boards for candidates to copy or dictated to them. One still finds students who could not write the dictated answers. I am also talking from experience. I used to mark WAEC as team leader but stopped marking some years ago. It is not encouraging at all.

It is commendable that WAEC attempts to curb exam malpractice by exiting paper exams to embrace CBT. However, going by JAMB experience, would grade “C” in WAEC remains the pass mark and would “C” be counted from 50-59? We should not forget that the JAMB cut off mark used to be 180 before CBT but ridiculously and laughably dropped to 120 (and even 100) after CBT. This drop in performance that leads to lowering the bar for pass mark shows how academically impoverished many Nigerian students are: they cannot pass JAMB or WAEC without malpractice. I critiqued this nonsense of admitting students who failed woefully into our schools in an article titled “Affirmative Action or Removing the Bar? A Critique of Admission Requirements into Government Schools in Nigeria,” published in Journal of Social and Educational Research based in Turkey.

To add salt to injury, the government keeps establishing more universities (in addition to the under funded ones) that need to admit students by all means. As if that is not funny enough, it keeps giving approval to the establishment of private universities that are also desperate in need of students. As I write, there are about 150 private universities across the federation. With F9 in JAMB, one is most qualified to be admitted into MOST of these advanced secondary schools that we call higher institutions. I have written a quite number of columns to condemn this unfortunate abuse of JAMB cut off mark. Wouldn’t WAEC go the way of JAMB after transition to CBT?

What is even more unfortunate is that I have not seen Academic Staff Union of Universities ASUU—that prides itself as the only existing union in Nigeria—shut down the universities in protest against this nonsense. In addition to other legitimate demands, ASUU should demand that our universities should no longer be used as dumping grounds for ill-taught, untaught, and assisted-to-pass students.

To stop mass failure, government should invest heavily in education. It should pay teachers reasonably, ensure that they are disciplined and upwardly revise JAMB cut off mark. Examination malpractioners among teachers, parents, and students should be given exemplary punishment as a deterrent. We can be better.

Abdulkadir Salaudeen

salahuddeenabdulkadir@gmail.com